The first 4 days of Wimbledon provided the usual share of upsets, with seeded players falling by the wayside, most notably in the womens draw 9th seed Marion Bartoli, 2011 quarter finalist. 5th seed Samantha Stosur also left in round 2 but given her abysmal record here, not such a shock to the tournament. Top ten players Tomas Berdych and John Isner, potential later opponents of Djokovic and Federer respectively, both were dismissed in round one. Of course all that paled into insignificance once the final ace had been served past Rafa Nadal under the Centre Court roof late on Day 4 by Czech player Lukas Rosol, never ranked higher than 65 and entering this event at 100.
The second round departure by the 7 time French Open champ stunned the world, and denied patrons the possibility of a fifth straight GS tournament final between he and Novak.
What it has done is to open one side of the draw for 4th seed Andy Murray to finally achieve his ambition to play in a Wimbledon final. The likely quarter final now is Murray v Tsonga, and the form of both after 2 matches is consistent with that line of thought. Ivo Karlolic in the second round was a dangerous proposition and Murray handled it very well, returning serve competently whenever he could see it or be anywhere near it, above all exhibiting a patience not always identified with the Scot's approach to big occasions.
At time of writing, Maria Sharapova has literally screamed into the fourth round and continued captivating all with her racquet work while annoying most with her gratuitous noise. The WTA in its "wisdom" is investigating the possibility of introducing formal measures to measure the noise levels of its players in an effort to dial down the decibels. The "grunt-o-meter" would not be applied to the current generation of players for fear of it damaging their game. What a load of rubbish. We would have the ludicrous situation of the 2 top ranked players in the world allowed to scream to their hearts delight while any newcomers would be subject to the new rules. The WTA should be using their top players as examples to the new generation of players and force them to stop screaming. It is not an asset to Sharapova or Azarenka - both win points because of their tennis skills and the noise is just to take unfair additional advantage. Thankfully for those watching at home there is the mute button.
Back to actual tennis and we have the chance to re-evaluate the predictions made pre-tournament. One change that won't be made by me is that of seeing Djokovic in the final. For all of Federer's winning ways against opponents that should be being taken to the cleaners by a player of his ilk, he just has not played to the level exhibited by the world number one. Ryan Harrison lost in straight sets to Novak but played a terrific match, his tennis probably sufficient to defeat most other players in the draw. The serving and ground shots of Djokovic were sublime. He hadn't peaked either - despite losing the first set against a determined Radek Stepanek, there was never a doubt that a fourth round spot would be Novak's. This time the clinic given over the final 3 sets centred on return of serve and it featured some of the best seen at Wimbledon in years. Two Davis Cup mates meet in the round of 16 but Viktor Troicki will need to be exponentially better than his polished performance ousting Juan Monaco if he is to rid us of the defending champ.
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